Evernote, Vine and other Android apps now available for Chrome OS and Chromebooks

Google is taking a big step in offering Android features on its Chrome OS by allowing a few Android apps to run on Chromebooks for the first time.

Google announced that four Android apps are the first to run on Chrome OS and can be downloaded from the Chrome Store. They include the note taking app Evernote, Twitter's video clip app Vine, the children's reading skills improvement app Sight Words and the language learning app Duolingo.

Google's blog announcement added, "These first apps are the result of a project called the App Runtime for Chrome (Beta), which we announced earlier this summer at Google I/O. Over the coming months, we'll be working with a select group of Android developers to add more of your favorite apps so you'll have a more seamless experience across your Android phone and Chromebook."

What do you think of this plan to allow Android apps to run on Chrome OS?

If they can open up ChromeOS to most Android apps it could eat away a big chunk of Windows. I'd love to run my many of my Android apps on a traditional laptop/desktop but the current Windows emulators have poor performance and experience. This could be huge with the right integration between ChromeOS and Android. Think about what Apple is doing with Mac and iOS integration... As a network engineer I could never give up a Windows desktop but I can see a Chromebook in my future if they open it up to most Android apps. This alone would get me to buy a Chromebook.

Dang... I was hoping that the new Evernote would allow offline usage. Meaning, the actual notes/data are stored locally and sync'd up whenever you get back online. NOPE. This is a "premium" feature, of course, but the offline capacity is the main reason I pay the $40 yearly.
Still, the app looks solid.

Since I'm not an engineer like a couple of you guys and have been wondering whether a Chromebook makes sense, this argument is of interest. While not brand new to Android (a bit over 2 years), it's my impression that of all companies, Google is the cutting edge. Google Now is a perfect example as is the elegance we've seen Android achieve. When I look at my desktop PC experience I do indeed spend lots of time online, but also work offline with Word and a couple of other programs. That said, the Chromebook size, cost and speed seem very attractive, though screen resolutions seem lacking. Adding Android apps to the mix make it far more inviting.

I think too many people get hung up in the "Windows substitute" argument. In my mind, it's much more of a mobile device, and a very good one at that. When you first get it, it takes only a few, very short minutes to go from unboxing to using it and thereafter, you can go from boot to using within 7 seconds. I highly recommend it. I have 2, one of which is at college with my son right now.

Yeah, a lot of the earlier editions have some disappointing screens, but some of the newer models coming out support HD and IPS. The Samsung Chromebook 2 springs to mind and I think Dell has one of them too.

This might actually be a big deal. If Google opens up the entire Google Play Store to Chromebooks, this could resolve one of the biggest downsides to owning a Chromebook, which is the availability of apps. If Microsoft develops a good version of office for Android, and that version of Office is eventually able to be opened on a Chromebook, I see some people making a jump.

There will always be a market for Windows machines simply because Chromebooks don't provide enough horsepower for power-hungry applications (graphic design, movie/music editing, etc.). For those that only browse the web and create Word documents and Excel spreadsheets, the available of Office on a Chromebook could be huge.

OK, you can't use it offline like you can Google Docs, but that's a choice by Microsoft, not Google.

You're 100% right that Chromebooks still don't do the power stuff, but the population that actually needs power tools is a small percentage of the compute-using public.

I think too much emphasis is placed on Chromebook being a Windows competitor. Yeah, it does that, but in my mind, Chromebooks are a much bigger threat to tablets. Since getting my Chromebook, I still use my Mac (for work mostly), but my Chromebook gets the lion's share of evening browsing/email/video/reddit surfing/document writing. My tablets (iPad and Nexus 7) are mostly unused, only occasionally being cracked open for game play. But even there, my phone suffices for a lot of that too. This Android app support is an interesting step toward cannibalizing the tablet market. Although let's be realistic - at the moment, it's mostly a technology demo. It will be interesting to see where it goes from here.

For graphics, audio, or video manipulation, I would gladly use my laptop. For web browsing and everything else, I wouldn't mind using a Chromebook. Google Docs is great for simple tasks, but it'd be nice to have a proper office suite (i.e., Microsoft Office). I would think that Chromebooks have enough juice to run Word, Excel, or PowerPoint.

I was just trying to say that, with a keyboard and mouse/touchpad attached to an Android tablet, you'd have the only thing that's missing from a Chromebook, which is apps. And no cons. Well, maybe screen size would be one. But there's the 12.5 inch Samsung Note Pro now, and HP has announced an Android laptop, so there you go..

I had the first one, and then the Transformer Prime. While I think Asus makes a good product (I bought an Asus laptop as a result of my happiness with the build quality of the Transformer products), I felt that the Transformer tablets weren't up to par with what they should have been able to do. I experienced a ton of lag and hangups on both devices. Unacceptable for a device that costs that much (for the tablet and keyboard combo).

I never said it would. My point was that there is a lot more competition out there. Windows is no longer the default choice for personal computing. Even in business, Mac OSX is largely accepted and a fair amount of business is being done on Linux as well. Certainly schools have discovered both iPads and ChromeOS. Computing itself, even for business, has largely expanded to include mobile computing as well.

Because it was designed from the ground up in an internet world. Windows suffers from the bloat of being birthed in the late 1980s, with so much of it's architecture based on old CP/M paradigms. Ever wonder why you have a C: drive? Why, to be compatible with CP/M, of course!

ChromeOS was built from the ground up to be very well sandboxed. There's no need for antivirus, separate firewall programs and no BSoD to spoil your day. ChromeOS' leanness really is its strength.

Finally, I wouldn't bother with Windows if I find myself needing more apps than ChromeOS can handle. Mac and OSX are my choice. I have zero need to run Windows at all these days.

"Because it was designed from the ground up in an internet world. Windows suffers from the bloat of being birthed in the late 1980s"

Have you used Windows since the 1980s? Probably not. These are tired arguments. Is there some truth to them? Sure. Does any of these complaints materially effect the end user experience? Not really. Windows 8.1 runs perfectly well in 2 gigs of ram on modest Atom chips. My wife has a Venue 8 Pro and it's a great little tablet. As for security, the only reason alternate OSs like Chrome OS and OSX are more secure is because they have, in comparison, tiny market shares. If they had the market share of Windows, they'd be just as big of a target for malicious code, and as we've seen recently with SSL vulnerabilities, the open source model doesn't inherently guarantee security.

I'm glad to see Google opening Chrome OS to run Android apps, but it *is* getting away from the original intention of Chrome OS (do everything in the browser), and it *is* a response to the obvious limitation of a cloud-only approach to functionality. I think it's a good move, but to bash Windows instead of admitting the move is stupid.

As for why would anyone bother with Windows? Because not everyone is an Apple fan. Mac and OSX is your choice. Good for you. You get a gold star. Windows and PC's are my choice, because they let me build the equivalent of a $12,000 Mac for $6000. Actually, not even equivalent, because my system has TWO 10 core Xeons, where the Mac is limited to one. And finally, Windows is a tool. Nothing more, nothing less. It runs the applications I need to run, and it does so efficiently, stably and on whatever hardware I happen to prefer buying. If that freedom isn't important to you, then OSX is a fine choice, but don't think it's somehow inherently superior. It's simply a different tool for different needs.

I never said anything about OSX being superior. My point was only that the question shouldn't really be "Why not Windows?", but instead "Why Windows?" I mean, when choosing a platform, Windows really isn't the default for a lot of people anymore. Choice is a good thing.

Back in the 1980s, when I was just starting work with IBM, I remember a very worried upper manager coming to me asking why people would want to use a PC when a timeshared 3270 terminal connected to a mainframe could do so much more and access much more data. To me, the parallels between Windows and ChromeOS are similar. It's not a question of "Why not use this thing that's been around for a while?", it's more "this new thing does everything I need it to do so I"m not even thinking about that older machine."

"It's not a question of "Why not use this thing that's been around for a while?", it's more "this new thing does everything I need it to do so I"m not even thinking about that older machine.""

But this news was about Google enabling Chrome OS to run local apps, as in more than cloud based only - which is precisely an acknowledgement that Chrome OS *wasn't* doing everything people need/want.

So the point to which you responded was valid - if ChromeOS is to become just another full fledged OS, why not just use Windows and have access to a near unlimited library of applications? Don't get me wrong, I like ChromeOS, but it's only viable for someone with very limited, specific and relatively modest needs.

And again, choice and cost are two primary reasons someone would choose Windows over a Mac. Remember, we're talking Chromebooks here, which (outside the Pixel) are $200-$300. You can get a decent, comparable Windows notebook in the upper end of that range, where the cheapest Mac notebook starts at $900 - kind of a different market segment. It's like saying "well, if someone wants more than a Prius, why bother looking at a Chevy Volt, just buy a Tesla".

As for my caffeine intake... sorry if I jumped in your shit a little too quickly. It just gets tiring hearing the same old criticisms of Windows and the bewilderment that anyone would still use it over a Mac. There are numerous, obvious and valid reasons might choose Windows, and the fact it, it's a highly reliable, capable, efficient and easy to use OS. It's not the cobbled together, barely usable mess that so many make it out to be. It wouldn't have achieved such market dominance if it was.

"It's not a question of "Why not use this thing that's been around for a while?", it's more "this new thing does everything I need it to do so I"m not even thinking about that older machine.""

But this news was about Google enabling Chrome OS to run local apps, as in more than cloud based only - which is precisely an acknowledgement that Chrome OS *wasn't* doing everything people need/want.

So the point to which you responded was valid - if ChromeOS is to become just another full fledged OS, why not just use Windows and have access to a near unlimited library of applications? Don't get me wrong, I like ChromeOS, but it's only viable for someone with very limited, specific and relatively modest needs.

And again, choice and cost are two primary reasons someone would choose Windows over a Mac. Remember, we're talking Chromebooks here, which (outside the Pixel) are $200-$300. You can get a decent, comparable Windows notebook in the upper end of that range, where the cheapest Mac notebook starts at $900 - kind of a different market segment. It's like saying "well, if someone wants more than a Prius, why bother looking at a Chevy Volt, just buy a Tesla".

As for my caffeine intake... sorry if I jumped in your shit a little too quickly. It just gets tiring hearing the same old criticisms of Windows and the bewilderment that anyone would still use it over a Mac. There are numerous, obvious and valid reasons might choose Windows, and the fact it, it's a highly reliable, capable, efficient and easy to use OS. It's not the cobbled together, barely usable mess that so many make it out to be. It wouldn't have achieved such market dominance if it was.